Chapter 15: The Changes
Jeremy P.O.V.
"Do you find it?" I asked Alfred over the Comms. We were currently tracking a werewolf that had completely lost its mind.
The funny thing was—it wasn't even the full moon, yet it had shifted into its animal form.
Mother Nature is insane.
She gave werewolves the ability to transform at will. As if that wasn't enough, she made them stronger, faster, and larger. Unlike the normal TVD werewolves, which are about the size of a regular wolf, Mother Nature decided to tweak them to be as large as a pony, much like the Twilight ones.
Don't even get me started on the vampires. As if these motherfuckers weren't bad enough, she decided to give them the power to control at least one type of animal.
Though not all of them can do this—only those with very strong willpower. Mostly, vampires that are five hundred years old have at least one type of animal they can manipulate. I met one yesterday who could control rats. And guess what the most common animal in New York City is? Rats. Fucking rats.
It was disgusting seeing thousands of rats crawling toward you. I was thankful I had my Lightning Manipulation skill. I created a field of lightning around me to stop those rats dead in their tracks.
Apart from controlling animals, these crazy bloodsuckers can manipulate blood—and some extremely strong ones can even manipulate weather and elements to an extent.
The sudden increase in power had affected both vampires and werewolves. Vampires had grown bolder, attacking humans blatantly. Hunters were fearful of them and hesitant to hunt for now. I guess humans have always been scared of the unknown.
They had to ask the witches for help but were turned down. Those hypocritical people.
I contacted the Hunter Association as THE ARBITER OF BALANCE. Apparently, my fame had already reached them. They promised me a million dollars for information about this new phenomenon, but I told them I would rid the city of the bad eggs for the sum of one hundred million dollars.
I was testing to see how deep their pockets were, and to my surprise, they accepted. Not that I was really shocked—after all, the Association was founded by powerful people, with a long history of politicians, priests, and other influential families.
Alfred had told me that if I wanted money, I could make the vampires give up the wealth they had accumulated. That realization made me feel a little stupid—destroying potential money bags without taking the contents.
I didn't feel too bad though. It's not like I was in need of money. My parents had left quite a fortune for Elena and me. But money is never too much, so Alfred had been compelling the bad vampires we caught to transfer their assets to me. Over the last two weeks, I had become a multi-billionaire in assets alone.
It had been very easy with Alfred around. I must say, he is truly competent. The System was right—I do need him. He had also been teaching me combat techniques. With my increased intelligence, learning anything had become remarkably easy.
"No, I haven't seen it yet, but I think I know where it might be," Alfred's voice came over the Comms.
"Where?" I asked, stopping in my tracks.
"The Riverside Rail Yard," he responded.
"Okay. Let's meet there," I said as I kicked my bike into full speed.
I arrived five minutes later, shutting the bike off. Damn, this thing can run fast as hell.
"Alfred, I'm here. I can't see you," I said over the Comms, leaning against my bike.
"Above you, sir," Alfred's voice replied. I looked up and saw him descending gracefully from the sky.
"That still looks cool," I said, impressed despite seeing him fly for the past two weeks.
"Thank you, sir," he replied with a slight bow.
Despite witnessing his flight repeatedly, I was still amazed every single time. Flight is one of Alfred's abilities. Apparently, because he was from another universe, the serum affected him differently than it would have in this universe. It was supposed to be a side effect, but if it worked in his favor, then so be it.
Apart from flight, he could transform into a gigantic bat and manipulate fire. It was really cool, though not as satisfying as my lightning manipulation.
When I checked his status and saw his abilities two weeks ago. Jealousy hit me—I wanted to buy a flight skill from the System, but the stingy System priced it at 50,000 System Points. Though I had the amount at the time, I didn't purchase it. I didn't yet know how strong the supernaturals had become, and I needed the points for my stats.
The System had also undergone a change the moment my physical stats reached 1000. The rate of exchanging stat points had increased from 10:1 to 100:1.
I had cursed the System for being a fraud, but it ignored me. I wished I could punch it.
There was an upside though—the amount of System Points I received from my kills had increased slightly.
Anyway, I had more than enough System Points now, which I planned to use to buy a lot of skills once I was done with this wolf.
Werewolves were no longer at a disadvantage against vampires like before, since they could turn at will. That meant full moon or not, they were at full strength.
There was one problem: after the power boost Mother Nature had given them, the human side of their minds wasn't really in control. It was their animal side that dominated.
There had been multiple reports of animal attacks at the police station. Werewolves had been attacking both vampires and humans. It made me think humanity must have offended her somehow. It was almost as if she wanted humans to go extinct with the amount of power she pumped into these creatures.
I couldn't blame her entirely. Humans had caused the most damage to her, of course. Deforestation, bush burning, even bombing parts of her. We were almost like a virus, causing harm wherever we went. If I were her, I'd want to do the same.
Anyway, judging by how things were going, I was certain it wouldn't be long before the public became aware of the supernatural.
I opened my status page to check my progress:
Host: Jeremy Gilbert
Race: Human
Age: 18
Location: New York
Strength: 1300
Agility: 1300
Perception: 1500
Endurance: 1500
Intelligence: 1500
Willpower: 1500
Vitality: ♾️
Charm: 1000
Stats Points: 150 (exchange rate: 100 SP = 1 stat point)
Skill Points: 0 (exchange rate: 10 SP = 1 skill point)
SP (System Points): 101,833
Skills:
Absolute Hit (Advanced)
Cooking Skills (Intermediate)
Regeneration (Advanced)
Aura (Intermediate)
Sixth Sense (Intermediate)
Tactical Analysis (Intermediate)
Parallel Focus (Intermediate)
Phantom Punch
Dimension Walker
Dash
Phantom Steps
Magic Immunity (Intermediate)
Lightning Manipulation (Intermediate)
Compulsion (Basic)
Dream Walker
Telekinesis
...
Items:
Gilbert Ring
Desert Eagle x2
Triumph Speed Triple RS
Vibranium Trench Coat
...
Shop: Available
Pet/Companion: Available
I had gained a lot of skills from reaching my stats thresholds, but there was a limit to the number of skills I could own. I removed the less useful ones to open up slots.
"Let's go hunting," I said, grinning.